J'attendrai
by Metranavoradexantar
Summary: AU fic: Eleven and River in France, 1940. Additional chapters added.
1. Chapter 1

They take breakfast together, as usual. He breaks his egg, absently dabs at a spot of jam on the tablecloth, while she looks at him over the pages of the newspaper. "It's coming soon, you know," she remarks, and he gives a strange half-smile.

"And we sit here like we're waiting for it. You and me."

She lays the paper down. "We both need to stop waiting," she says, with an urgency that surprises even her. "We can get out, cross the Channel. My father's family is in England. I've already been writing to them."

He seems not to have heard her. "Do you ever think that perhaps we'd met before?"

* * *

Mélodie L'Étang, otherwise Mélodie Williams, met János Kovács after he took up residence in the apartments just down the hall from her. The hotel was nearly empty, and, intrigued at the arrival of a new guest, she decided to introduce herself. "Hello, _chéri_," she said, as she stepped into the lift beside him; he awkwardly returned the greeting. Within a week, they were talking like old friends. She knows something about archeology and he knows something about astronomy, and the juxtaposition of stars and dust is, in a way, fitting.

* * *

A slight breeze stirs in the curtains of her sitting room as the early spring twilight deepens outside. Neither of them has spoken for the last quarter of an hour, but she hums to herself: _J'attendrai, le jour et le nuit, j'attendrai toujours_. When she looks across the room at him, she sees that all the false brightness has gone out of his face; he's older than she knew he could be, old and alone, no longer trying to conceal it. "János," she murmurs, "Jani, what is it?"

He doesn't turn to her. "You were right," he says. "Everything's coming."


	2. Chapter 2

They lean against the railing, watching Calais recede farther into the horizon. It's a cold morning, and she shivers underneath her pashmina shawl, while he stands there bareheaded, his coat open. She can tell by his eyes that he didn't sleep last night, and that, she says to herself, makes two of them.

"_Viszontlátásra_," he murmurs, as they drift into the open water.

* * *

Mélodie hasn't seen her uncle Arthur in at least ten years. He's notably greyer, and implicitly wealthier, but he reacts to her with the same bemused curiosity. Nobody thought that the marriage between Rory Williams, a doctor from Leicestershire, and Amélie L'Étang, a minor French actress, would succeed; the fact that it did, and produced her, is, for him, a source of confusion.

He pauses in front of the fire, tossing a scrap of paper into the flames. "Who's this fellow you came over with, again?"

"Professor János Kovács," she says. "From Debrecen. He's a friend."

* * *

She gets a position at St. Hilda's, as a lecturer in history. After a week, János comes to visit her in her rooms. He sits across from her on the stiffened sofa, not drinking the tea she offered. "You are fortunate," he says, with a half-smile. "I haven't yet found anyone who needs an astronomer."

Mélodie doesn't know how to respond. The flat he's taken is small and drafty, with bare plaster walls and a view of a street corner. "You're still watching the stars, aren't you?" she says suddenly. "What do you think they say?"

He stares past her, toward the window full of night. "I do not know," he murmurs. "I would rather not know."


	3. Chapter 3

France has fallen.

They sit side by side on Mélodie's sofa, listening to the radio. Outside the window, an oblivious bird sings. She imagines the ruins of Calais lying there like the site of an ancient battle, and sees herself sifting through the debris, unearthing bureau drawers, lampshades, broken vases. The dust of dry bones in the sun.

Wordlessly, János rises and makes his way toward the door, and something strikes against her heart. "Don't go, my love," she says, and she draws him, almost unwilling, into a kiss.

* * *

The sheaf of essays is almost enough to keep her from thinking of anything else. She reads through them too deliberately, noting an awkward phrase here, an incorrect date there. The cup of tea sitting at her elbow has gone cold, and she doesn't switch on the lamp, even though the words are beginning to fade.

Mélodie hasn't seen János since he pulled away from her clasped hand and disappeared into the hall. She wanted to follow him. Instead, she stood there for a long time, unable to care about the Luftwaffe darkening the sky. That night, she dreamed of running from something she couldn't see, trying to find him and hide from the heavy footsteps.

* * *

She opens the door to see him standing there, and, for a moment, can't speak. "János, you came."

"We've met at a strange time," he murmurs. "No one knows how long we have."

"But—there are things we can know."

"Yes," he says. "But I am not sure yet." He raises his eyes and looks into her face. "I would like to be sure, someday."

Far away, the circling stars burn in constellations, in patterns that nothing on earth can change. "I'll wait," she says.


End file.
